Lithography at the sub-10 nm scale is essential for the fabrication of future integrated circuits, as well as a variety of other nanodevices. Extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography, a contender for “next generation lithography,” has been delayed due to many issues, including low throughput and high cost. Thus, the search for alternatives to photolithographic techniques continues.
Various alternatives have been explored, such as block copolymer directed self-assembly (DSA), nanoimprint lithography, ion or electron beam proximity or projection lithographies, multiple e-beam lithography, and scanning probe lithography. However, each has disadvantages, such as producing a limited variety of patterns, needing further defect reduction, requiring fragile stencil masks, needing large field optics, Coulomb interaction limitations, resolution limitations, or slow fabrication speeds.
Systems and methods for rapidly fabricating nanopatterns in a parallel fashion over large areas utilizing nanopantography in combination with a second etching step to transfer the nanopattern to the underlying material are discussed herein.